


Rainbow

by pencilguin



Series: Culmets Celebration Week [4]
Category: Star Trek: Discovery
Genre: Fluff, M/M, Pride, Queer Themes, references to historical homophobia & racism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-16
Updated: 2020-10-16
Packaged: 2021-03-08 21:55:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,913
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27043864
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pencilguin/pseuds/pencilguin
Summary: [set post-S2, but no spoilers for S3]Hugh and Paul are observing a holiday to commemorate Pride, and educate one of their fellow crew members about the history behind it.For Culmets Celebration 2020Theme: Pride and Queerness in the Future
Relationships: Hugh Culber/Paul Stamets
Series: Culmets Celebration Week [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1988299
Comments: 8
Kudos: 23
Collections: Culmets Celebration 2020





	Rainbow

**Author's Note:**

> I am grateful for my friends and Anthony Rapp and Wilson Cruz and all those who constantly speak up and educate people, including myself, about the lives and issues and struggles of LGBTQIA+ people.  
> Additional thanks to [Cygfa](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cygfa) and [OrmondSacker](https://archiveofourown.org/users/OrmondSacker) for making sure there are no blunders in this fic.

Hugh is woken up by something tickling his nose that turns out to be a mix of simulated morning sunlight and soft lips framed by a light, pale stubble. Leisurely squinting his eyes open rewards him with his favorite sight in the universe — made even more precious by its rarity, because Paul Stamets is not much of a morning person and seldom awake enough before Hugh to wear a smile as relaxed and comfortable as this one to greet him with.

“Happy Pride Day, honey.”

His smile meets Hugh’s for a long, slow good morning kiss. Hugh ends it with a satisfied hum before he opens his eyes again.

“Happy Pride Day to you too, love. It’s been so long since our last one.”

“Nine-hundred and thirty-two years,” Paul calculates without hesitation. He’s clearly comfortable where he’s lying on top of Hugh, who more than welcomes the warmth and reassuring weight of his body, a gift to their lives that he’ll never take for granted again. The memories of all the times they nearly lost each other threaten to make him shiver again, so he pushes them away for now. Today is for joy.

“Still up for the plan?” he asks, lets his left hand find Paul’s hip under the covers.

“Mmmh…” Paul hums uncertainly, fingers tracing over Hugh’s jaw. “Can’t we just stay in bed and have sex all day?”

Hugh laughs openly. “That would be an appropriate way of celebrating Pride Day, for sure. Although I think neither of us is young enough to have that kind of stamina.”

“I thought your body was brand new? ‘Pristine’, as Tracy called it.”

“I wish.” Hugh chuckles. “But not that kind of new. Come on, today is also about community.”

Paul smiles down at him lovingly. “I know. I promised, after all.” He wiggles his eyebrows. “Just one round then?”

“Of course, babe. Got anything in mind?”

Paul grins, then leans down to whisper in his ear, and Hugh’s smile grows even bigger.

***

It’s late noon by now, and the mess hall has gotten packed. Hugh notices Commander Nhan standing a few meters from the replicators, turning her head in all directions, and when she looks towards them he raises his arm to wave her over.

“Come sit with us, Commander!”

She walks up to their table but still appears a little unsure. “I don’t want to intrude; it looks like you’re on a lunch date.”

Paul handwaves her comment away with a smile. “Don’t worry about it, of course you’re welcome.”

“Thank you.” She smiles at them both in return and sets down her tray before taking the seat to the left of Hugh. They’ve both almost finished their meals but are in no hurry to leave, and Hugh may never grow tired of seeing Paul finally be comfortable in the company of the rest of the crew.

Paul resumes his recount of the paper on aquatic fungi discovered on Bajor in the 2530s that he finished reading last night, while Hugh eats and listens attentively. Nhan quickly taps something into her PADD before putting it back on her tray and starting to eat as well. When Hugh has finished and puts down his fork, something seems to catch her eye.

“I’ve never seen you two wear these before.” She points at the rainbow bracelet peeking out from under Hugh’s off-duty jacket sleeve, matching the one Paul is wearing today when they don’t have to adhere to uniform regulations.

Hugh shakes his sleeve back a bit further to show it to her.

“It’s a special occasion.”

Nhan’s eyebrows arch up. “Oh?”

He exchanges a quick glance with Paul, who reaches for Hugh’s right hand on the table with his left and squeezes it with a smile.

“Today,” Hugh explains, “back home on Earth, that is — it’s Pride Day. It’s a day to celebrate the diversity of human gender identities, romantic and sexual orientations, and to commemorate the fight for our equality.”

Nhan looks at him with confusion.

“That sounds like it was a big deal.”

Hugh sighs a little at the reminder of some of Earth’s more painful history, although he doesn’t lose his smile. He exchanges a quick glance with Paul, who’s got a forkful of cannelloni in his mouth and just nods at him to continue his explanation.

“It was, yeah. We — humans have long had a habit to distrust what they don’t know or don’t understand. Anything that’s different from them. Especially when it’s done by the majority, by those who are in charge… it has caused a lot of harm. Humans of different races, for example, with different skin colors.”

“I heard about that, I think,” Nhan responds. “At the Academy, in one of our lectures on Federation cultures.”

“A lot of gender identities, romantic and sexual orientations fell under these minority groups of people that suffered a lot of oppression and discrimination for centuries.” Hugh pauses to think for a moment, remembering something he learned several years ago. “To my knowledge, the percentages among Barzans are more evenly spread out than among humans.”

Nhan nods. “Yes. Attraction to your own or other genders, to multiples or none at all, they’re all about equally common. It never would occur to us to discriminate against anyone based on that.”

Hugh can’t help throwing a glance at Paul again and sees a hint of wistfulness in his smile now. They both share an interest in queer history; he knows how passionate his partner can get about the subject.

“Yeah, humanity has a bad track record with a lot of things. But we’ve kept growing and learning, because people kept pushing and fighting for our society to be better, to grow to its full potential, for everybody.”

While he’s been speaking, Paul has managed to empty his plate. Pushing it away from himself slightly, he takes over from Hugh.

“For the longest time, we — people like us, people who weren’t exclusively attracted to the opposite, binary gender, or people who were assigned an incorrect gender at birth — had to hide and live their true lives in secret, they were erased from history. Those who refused were met with violence, slurs and abuse until movements for their liberation and equal rights grew strong enough to effectively fight back. With visibility and the number of allies grew the rights of our community, even though it was still an uphill battle.”

Hugh takes in the passionate energy Paul radiates, the sound of his voice so incredibly soothing and captivating at the same time. Nhan, too, seems to have temporarily forgotten her massaman curry in favor of his impromptu history lesson.

“Events to celebrate pride in our community were more and more co-opted by corporations for profit, the rights of any marginalized groups continued to erode and hate groups which some had ignorantly believed dead resurged, until everything cumulated in the last World War on Earth. Everything collapsed, and humans were forced to rebuild a new society from the ground up, this time without repeating the mistakes of the old one.”

“Wow,” Nhan comments wide-eyed. “You’ve had some turbulent history.”

“You could say that,” Hugh responds with a sad smile. “And this is only the tip of the iceberg.”

She ponders his words for a moment. “You know, you humans are scary sometimes. Fascinating, but scary.”

Hugh chuckles quietly at the remark. “Yeah. Sometimes we scare each other, too.”

She resumes eating, but directs her attention back to Paul, waiting for him to continue.

“We were able to create a new, truly equal society, without national borders. No more discrimination and a strict enforcement of equal rights. It took a few decades to work out the kinks, but eventually we got there. And with new advances in technology, finally no more poverty or hunger. We managed to unite and reach for the stars.”

There’s something infinitely soft in the expression on Paul’s face that makes Hugh’s heart feel like it’s going to spill over with fondness. He notices that his own thumb has started to rub small circles into the back of Paul’s hand on the table.

“So now humanity has established a day to commemorate everything that our community has gone through: the struggles, the victories, the losses, but also the joy of proudly being yourself. The extra hurdles some of us had to face have been leveled, the exceptions that threw us back have been erased. Our labels have become our own.”

“Labels?” Nhan asks curiously.

“Well, the — hm.” Paul pauses for a moment, his brain working. “This is probably not going to translate well into Federation Standard, where all of the terms are very neutral and descriptive. But in many Earth languages, the labels we now use to describe ourselves were once thrown at us to insult and to hurt us, or to pathologize our identities as a condition that needed to be fixed. We’ve reclaimed them, we own them. They’re not assigned to us, _we choose them_ , to proudly declare who we are. For example, I am a man who is exclusively attracted to other men. I am _‘gay’_ —” he deliberately uses the English word — “that is the term I identify with, and I embrace the history and the power behind it. I don’t want to be called a _‘homosexual’_. Maybe there are people out there who like the word; I haven’t met many. But it’s every person’s individual choice, and it’s important to respect that choice.”

Nhan smiles at him. “That is beautiful.”

Paul’s cheeks turn slightly pink at the remark. Hugh proudly squeezes his hand on the table.

Before taking another bite of her lunch she asks, “So what about the rainbow?”

This time it’s Hugh who answers with a smile. “Every good liberation movement needs a flag. This one is ours.”

Nhan finishes chewing and swallowing her last bite but before she can say anything, her PADD chirps with a priority message. After a glance at the screen, her face scrunches up apologetically.

“I’m sorry, Commanders. Duty calls.” She gets up. Paul and Hugh follow suit.

“I hope we didn’t steal too much of your break time with our little history lesson,” Hugh says as they pick up their trays to return them.

“Not at all. Thank you for teaching me about your culture.”

“Commander,” Paul says in the corridor outside the mess hall. Nhan turns around curiously to face him. He blushes a little again, but continues. “After your shift, if you’re interested… There’s a little dinner party tonight at 2000, in the big observation lounge on deck seven, in celebration of Pride Day. Anyone’s welcome.”

She returns his smile. “I’d be happy to. Commanders, I’ll see you later.”

After she’s left them and disappeared around the corner, Hugh turns to Paul, smiling brightly.

“I’m impressed. You don’t even like being at parties normally, and now you’re inviting more people to them.”

“Don’t be silly.” There’s no sting behind the banter at all, it’s obvious that he can’t even keep the smile off his face. “It’s Pride Day, that’s special.”

Long ago, before his death, Hugh would’ve made sure with a couple of quick glances up and down the corridor that they had some privacy. But now he just leans over to give Paul a kiss.

“I know, darling. — C’mon, you promised to show me what you and Linus have been growing behind the captain’s back.”

Paul grins, then slides his hand into Hugh’s. “Let’s go then.”


End file.
